Recently I went to check out a new apartment on the lower level of a middle-aged couple’s house. It had been raining, and the grassy “sidewalks” were a bit saturated. I didn’t think much of it and parked my truck next to a big hedge on the grass. After viewing the apartment, and trying to make a good impression on the owners of the house, I returned to my truck to take off and go sacrifice tourists to the gods of all things real estate. But my truck wouldn’t budge. I was stuck. Stuck in the mud

No problem, I thought, AAA to the rescue! But there was a problem with my genius plan. I HAD LEFT MY PHONE AT HOME. If you know me, you probably know how attached I am to my phone. I am a phone ninja. So this kind of ninja-negligence is pretty rare.

I spent about 10 minutes staring at my steering wheel trying to figure out what to do. Apparently, this does not make cars move.

Eventually I had to break down and go back to the house and ask for help. The guy was very nice. He lent me his phone and I called AAA.

DU NUH NUH NUH NUH BATMAN! I mean triple AAA.

A very scrufy AAA man shows up to dislodge my car. Now, if you remember from the beginning of my story, and I’m sure you do, I parked next to a hedge. In my masterful attempts to drive away from the mud trap, I had gotten further wedged into the hedge. So he warned me, there may be scratches. It went a little something like this. And it made. my. day.

Scruffy AAA man: Now, you do know that there may be scratches on your truck

Me: Yeah…

Scruffy AAA man: And you do know that when I pull your truck away, it may get more scratches. Is this okay with you?

Me: Well, I mean, if there’s nothing you can do about it there’s nothing you can do about it. And anyways, I mean, I think I’ll be okay. It’s a truck.

Civil Unions and Domestic Partnerships are not equal to “Gay Marriage” for two reasons: One, separate is not equal. Two, a state-level Civil Union or Domestic Partnership still denies gay couples thousands of federal rights granted to straight couples

There is no such thing as Gay Marriage. There is only Marriage, and it is open to every American citizen or it is not. No one ever got down on one knee and said “will you gay marry me”

The Defense Against Marriage Act, DOMA, passed during the Clinton administration is unconstitutional because it defies the Full Faith and Credit clause that ensures that laws in one state be honored by all states. Any legislation passed that defies the constitution cannot stand

All constitutional amendments passed by states to deny marriage to gay couples are erroneous. State constitutions must be in concert with the Federal Constitution to be valid in law

This is not a States Rights Issue. Framer James Madison made very clear that the language of the 10th amendment which introduced the concept of States Rights and Federalism say that “The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.” and not “The powers not expressly delegated…” This has been interpreted through centuries of case law to mean that a power need not be expressly and necessarily granted to the federal government to still be within the providence of the federal government. The federal government can implement principles from the federal constitution, primarily through the courts, and override state law. Brown v Board of Education in 1954 decided among other things (such as separate is not equal and the implementation of equal protection under the law) that a single state did not have the right to decide issues pertaining to rights in the Federal Constitution.

Marriage is a civil right. This precedent was set in 1967 in the landmark case Loving v Virginia which declared on a national level that to prevent interracial marriages was unconstitutional stated in its opinion that “Marriage is one of the “basic civil rights of man”

And finally, a main reason Governor Lingle gave for why she vetoed Civil Union Bill HB444 in Hawai’i was that she did not want Civil Unions to be her legacy.

There are two other legacies that I would like to discuss, and in our adult-dominated world, often ignored.

They are that of the 82 year old couple who have for their whole lives been fighting prejudice and injustice, who now can’t hold each others hand as one dies in the hospital because his partner was denied visitation rights

The other is that of the 15 year old kid, that wants nothing more to be normal, seeing messages of a life of difference and abnormality because of who he or she is that are reflected in the laws of our society, and is so filled with the inner turmoil and self-hate that comes with being an outcast in your own country — a legally codified outcast — that they reach for a rope instead of seeking equal opportunity.

Re: “Violation” of Religious Freedom Concerning the Inclusion of Gay People in the Institution of Marriage

Before Judge Vaughn Walker’s abominable decision, you, according to your 1st amendment rights and staunch religious convictions were free to think that gay marriage is wrong and homosexuality immoral. Now, after this landmark example of judicial activism and downright disregard for common sense, you…can…STILL THINK THAT!

You can do what you could do before

Gay people can do what they couldn’t do before

Look. Here’s the deal. Freedom of religion is about personal expression, period. You have every right to personally express that homosexuality and the inclusion of gay people in marriage is wrong. What you can’t do, and have never had the right to do, is actively use those beliefs to harm others. This includes hate speech, harassment, or discrimination. And now that this inconvenient fact can be enforced because equality has been legally codified does not infringe on your personal exercise of religion, conscience, or freedom. Because it’s not about you.

]]>https://justinadayswork.wordpress.com/2010/08/11/go-go-gadget/feed/0justinadaysworkgo go gadgetlife notwithstandinghttps://justinadayswork.wordpress.com/2010/07/11/life-notwithstanding/
https://justinadayswork.wordpress.com/2010/07/11/life-notwithstanding/#respondSun, 11 Jul 2010 07:27:32 +0000http://justinadayswork.wordpress.com/?p=249]]>Rhode Island drivers may be psychos, but they do at least stop for pedestrians in traffic. Hawaiians (general Aloha notwithstanding)…don’t. So when I was trying to cross a busy street today I spent about 10 minutes watching wheels go by before making any kind of move. A man walking past noticed my frustration and suggested that I just start walking. I casually informed him that there was a large moving vehicle in the shape of a bus about 100 yards away, but he insisted and started crossing the street himself. Thinking him either stoned, stupid, or just suicidal, I held back until the giant death machine disguised as a benevolent city bus slammed on its brakes, offering me that clear path.

For those of you who don’t know, I got in a car accident with a city bus at highway speeds about 6 months ago. Apparently, my brakes were under the impression that they didn’t have to show up to work that particular Wednesday (lack of vacation time notwithstanding). After skidding across two lanes on I-95 south, I turned my head just in time to see a city bus slam into my passenger side and crush my car like a frat boy with a can of natty light. This is not a good image to have in your head when trying to cross a street full of busses. If my car had been turned the other way, you’d all probably be sending my parents flowers right now. But I made it across (bus PTSD notwithstanding)

So I’m here in Hawai’i. When I’m not crossing roads of death, I’m trying to set up an Independent Study in furniture design at UH. Or should I say “Directed Study.” Apparently independence is not a cherished value out here (1776 declarations notwithstanding.) I have to come up with a detailed syllabus and write a 2 page typed proposal that must get approved by all the head honchos of the art department. The instructions for the requirements for the study take up an entire typed, single spaced page. I got to the part about “students doing better with structure” and actually laughed out loud. Structure? Get out of town. If there’s one thing a Brown education does not prepare you for, it’s requirements, deadlines, and structure. That and the reality that not everything is possible with persistence and a Dean’s Note (ceramics studios notwithstanding) (tool-faces in the Art Department withstanding). I mean, I’m still getting used to the fact that I can’t carry a pocket-sized Dean Hansen around with me everywhere to solve all of my problems (the problem that I don’t have a real Brown degree yet notwithstanding).

But people who don’t go to Brown don’t understand this, and people who go to Brown don’t understand that other people don’t understand this. So when my teacher Dave said that I should do an Independent Study, I filled in the mental gaps with what I thought the preparation for an independent study to be, namely,” la dee da dee da hey Professor Gonsher, sign this” (mental picture here should be frolicking teletubbies). So now I’m working to come up with something more concrete than “I’m gonna, like, make furniture” to show to the UH higher-ups.

I was explaining all of this to my dad, but he had more important things to talk about. Specifically, that he’s learning to speak cat. We had about a 10 minute conversation about his new language skills (official recognition of “cat” as a language notwithstanding). It went a little something like this:

Dad: Guess what. I’m learning to speak cat
Rachel: Cat?
Dad: Yeah, I’m getting really good at it
Rachel: Cat?
Dad: Yeah. See, I go up to a cat and I go “merooow” and they go “merooow” and then I go “merooow”
Rachel: That’s…wow…
Dad: Yeah and then I scratch their heads and we keep talking
Rachel: How does shmolister vernicitude feel about this (family dog’s actual name notwithstanding)?
Dad: (a remarkably sullen turn in tone of voice) He’s with your sister for the week. I’m suffering. I’m just really…suffering. But at least I can speak cat

Now I’m not making fun of my dad. Not in the least. I think he’s great. I’m simply illustrating a point, one that I’ve conveyed many times. IT’S NOT MY FAULT. This kind of abject dorkiness is simply genetic and I apparently inherited every pocket-protector gene known to man. Alternatively, my dad’s genes for insane organizational skills seem to skip a generation. It’s too bad. Because when you combine my dorkiness with my complete scatter-brainedness, I’m like the Captain Planet of spaz (with our powers combined…) But at least there is a way for people to cope with it: shut up and find it endearing (fact that it’s not endearing notwithstanding).

…For the viewing of those who have at least at one point in time found my ramblings humorous. I know, I know, you’re not laughing at me…you’re laughing near me (everyone I know notwithstanding)

]]>https://justinadayswork.wordpress.com/2010/07/11/life-notwithstanding/feed/0justinadaysworkModify It!https://justinadayswork.wordpress.com/2010/05/09/modify-it/
https://justinadayswork.wordpress.com/2010/05/09/modify-it/#respondSun, 09 May 2010 15:30:44 +0000http://justinadayswork.wordpress.com/?p=245]]>So somehow I randomly started watching the Alabama Republican Gubernatorial debate. They all agree with each other. The only way to differentiate them is to see who answers a question more articulately.

But let me be more specific. There are a few concepts and terms with which every candidate agrees. Allow me to address one:

The legitimate use of the term “unborn baby” in the english language

I’m gonna be blunt. An “unborn baby” is not a baby

How can you be a baby if you are not yet born?

If you have to put a modifier in front of a word in order to properly describe something, you are no longer describing the same thing. You are describing something different. See, one baby has been born into this world, one baby has not. There’s something different about an “unborn baby.” And if it is so important to recognize that distinction, there’s something awry with calling it or treating it as the same thing.

There’s a word for an unborn baby. It’s called a fetus. So let’s stop equating abortion with the death of an actual baby without an umbilical cord that lives, eats, and breathes in the actual world. And doesn’t need a vernacular modifier.

This same concept even applies for gay marriage. Until the country / world sees gay marriage as simply marriage, it will always be different and lesser.

Call the fire department when if your house is on fire? Or your cat stuck in a lil’ tree?

Check out books from a public library?

Get your license renewed at the DMV?

Basked in the glory of clean floors and empty trashcans at the statehouse?

Used a Pell Grant to help pay for your degree at Fiscal Idiot State?

Watch the busted water main in front of your house get fixed?

Frolick in your favorite city park?

Do you, or will you, get a social security check in the mail?

Benefit from one of hundreds of other city, state, and federal services?

Yeah.

Thought so.

So next time you whine about losing all your hard earned money to those pork-barrel feds, remember that it’s not actually your money. It’s money you owe. You are paying for a variety of services you use everyday and for some reason feel entitled to have without supporting them monetarily so that they can function. I’m not naive enough to suggest that you benefit from every federally or state funded program — you don’t. But for every program out there that you either don’t believe in or don’t make use of, there’s another person out there who makes no use of a program that serves you. It’s called being a citizen. It’s called contributing a the greater good — a greater good that serves you every day in one way or another.

What really amuses me is that it’s the same people who decry taxes to pay for every day services that call programs like health care and welfare entitlement programs. Meanwhile, they don’t want to pay to support the services they use every day. Now that’s entitlement.

But it’s mine!!

]]>https://justinadayswork.wordpress.com/2010/04/27/entitlement/feed/0justinadaysworkspoiled bratA Day in the Life…https://justinadayswork.wordpress.com/2010/04/19/a-day-in-the-life/
https://justinadayswork.wordpress.com/2010/04/19/a-day-in-the-life/#respondMon, 19 Apr 2010 23:47:40 +0000http://justinadayswork.wordpress.com/?p=233]]>A day in the life…

Pssh…Amateurs

People whine about bureaucracy in congress. Get that president in line. Tell your senators what to do Goddamnit. They protest. Form tea parties rallies. Write letters. These patriots are gonna fight the man and the depths of hell will not stop them

These people are amateurs. This afternoon I walked into an institution where bureaucracy knows no bounds: Rite Aid. When I go to the pharmacy it’s like going to a gun fight. I have my paper prescriptions in one holster, the refillable bottles in the other. I know this is going to be a war.

Pharmacists have to follow regulations to the letter, and there are more regulations than pills in a bottle. So my simple quest to pick up an ol’ prescription becomes like slaying a minotaur deep inside the labyrinth: my prize, some little blue morsels in a bottle: my quest: a maze of insurance denials, miswritten or misread prescriptions, expiration dates 1 day past, and ornery, jaded pharmacists who just wished they could have been doctors.

With reservation, I place my prescription on the counter. You can’t be too careful with these people; there are rumors of pharmacy techs morphing into labyrinthine chimera on cue. My rule: never get too close. So at arms’ length, my scrip falls gingerly to the counter to be scooped up and examined brutally by the mythical beast in a lab coat.

“Oh no,” the pharmacist says, as she taps out letters on a computer keyboard. “Your insurance won’t be covering this.” High gear mode sets in. What is this pharmacist talking about? I thought insurance and I were pals. Last month the insurance company and I frolicked together with ponies and kittens, with rainbows showering down pharmaceuticals as they joyfully covered my prescription. But now it looks like things have changed. Maybe they don’t think this love affair will work after all. But insurance company! We were so good together!

I go to the ultimate source to trample the insurance company bureaucracy: my mother. Dialing her digits on my phone, holding back hyperventilating breaths, I told my knight in shining apron the situation: the insurance company had some kind of procedural problem now that I had a new ID number on my insurance card. “I’ll take care of this,” she said. I provided her with names and phone numbers, and told her to call me back. Thank god for mom, I thought, because all I could say was “screw perscriptions. I need a beer.”